Tanker's Triumph

From a trench freshly carved in the fat Ukrainian soil, Colonel General Pavel Rot-mistrov stared across the plain. In the distance smoke rose from burning villages. Buglike Russian tanks crawled forward, angrily broke up German counterattacks. Overhead, Stormoviks bombed and strafed. Before Rotmistrov's eyes ten encircled German divisions were being mashed out of existence.

Books and Death. In his dugout later, Rotmistrov met Soviet newsmen. Happily he talked of J. B. Priestley's Blackout in Gretley, of cabbages, and kings, and strategy. The newsmen were impressed: this tall, athletic man was a hero, one of Russia's ablest tank tacticians. Stooping over a map, he explained how the troops of the Second Ukrainian Front made a narrow breach in the German defenses, converted it into a major triumph:

"Under other circumstances we might have waited until the breach was widened. This time, however, the entire mass of our tanks was thrown into the breach. . . . Then, at once, they spread out behind the enemy lines. . . . Part of them reinforced our flanks; the main force continued to push forward to meet the tank forces of the First Ukrainian Front."

So fast and sudden was Rotmistrov's tank thrust, the Germans had no time to halt it. Then the Red artillery began to pound the encircled Germans, the air force launched its air blockade. In 14 days, 179 three-engined Junkers bringing in food and ammunition were shot down.

Victory's Fruits. Soviet generals, headed by famed Marshal Georgy Zhukov, Stalin's deputy, issued an ultimatum: "We guarantee life and safety to all ... who cease resistance [within 24 hours]. . . . All... who surrender . .. will be immediately supplied with food. . . ."

But Hitler's order was clear: resist -or die. The Germans fought. Rotmistrov's old enemy, Field Marshal Fritz Erich von Manstein, whom he had whipped a year earlier below Stalingrad, hurled eight tank divisions against the ring. The ring was dented, but it did not break.

Last week Moscow announced the liquidation of the pocket, listed the German losses: 55,000 dead within the trap, 21,800 outside it; 18,000 taken prisoner; 430 planes wrecked; 625 tanks and 500 guns destroyed or taken. Some 3,000 officers managed to escape in transports. Left behind was the body of General Wilhelm Stemmermann, Commander in Chief.

By this time Hero Rotmistrov was elsewhere. Best guess: he was at the head of the tatnk forces which this week broke into the German stronghold of Krivoi Rog.

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